1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing unit and, more particularly, to an image processing unit and an image processing method capable of selecting an image from among a plurality of images produced in continuous shooting, and a program capable of causing a computer to execute the method.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, image pickup apparatuses such as digital still cameras for picking up images of subjects such as a figures, producing photographic images thereof and recording the same are widely used. Some of these popular image pickup apparatuses are equipped with a continuously image pickup (i.e., continuous shooting) function.
A plurality of continuously shot photographic images may be recorded; a user can expect that a target photographic image is included therein. However, the user is sometimes bothered by manually selecting the target photographic image from among the plurality of photographic images. In order to address this problem, there has been proposed an image pickup apparatus in which an evaluation area is set for the evaluation of in-focus states of a plurality of focus-bracketed images, and images that are well-focused in the evaluation area are selected and recorded (see, for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2004-135029 (FIG. 3)).